DRUG TESTING FOR ALL STUDENTS MAY BE DESTRUCTIVE FOR AMERICAN RIGHTS

The new drug test policy at Sarasota Military Academy worries Vannessa
Kegel.

Her daughter, Stephanie, is supposed to be a sophomore there in the fall,
and she really liked her freshman year, including the strict rules.

The military style suits her, because she wants to become a military lawyer.

The charter school, paid for by the Sarasota County school district, has 420
students, a waiting list and well-known principal Dan Kennedy, once the
Sarasota High principal.

Kennedy just sent a letter to notify parents that to attend this fall, the
students will have to take a urine test for drug use. And throughout the
year, kids will be chosen by lottery to be tested again.

Stephanie, 15, doesn't mind. The tests will help keep some kids from getting
into drugs, and the school will be better if kids who use drugs are caught,
she told me.

"Kids are getting into stuff because of peer pressure," she said. "I think
it would really cut down on the kids who are being bad influences on
others." She wishes the drug tests would catch the cigarette smokers, too.

That thinking is just what bothers her mother. Kegel knows Stephanie is
smart, an honor student, drug-free, and good at arguing her point. But Kegel
wishes her future lawyer was arguing for privacy rights. Stephanie should be
upset about being required to provide urine on demand to prove she isn't
using drugs, her mom told me.

"Even with people suspected of a crime, they have to get a court order to
extract bodily fluids," Kegel said. "This should be a violation of civil
rights."

It may or may not be. The Supreme Court recently decided that public schools
can require drug testing for kids in extracurricular activities, but not for
all students. Still, it could allow testing of all students at charter
schools, which are supported by taxes but are run primarily by private
organizations.

Since parents chose whether their kids will go to a charter school, in
effect the tests would not be mandatory.

As Kennedy put it: "We will be the first high school in our state to provide
this opportunity for our school community."

But even if the school can require all students to be tested or leave, that
doesn't make it right, Kegel insists. Parents should decide if kids need
drug tests. Making even well-behaved students provide body fluids to
authorities on demand will not teach the principles of liberty, she says.

"How can the school district do this?" she asked.

Well, as I said, it isn't the district. It is the board and the principal at
the Sarasota Military Academy, which she and her daughter chose. They can go
back to a regular public school any time.

Stephanie adamantly doesn't want to. She told me she does understand her
mother's point about personal rights, but doesn't figure kids her age really
have such rights anyway, because their parents have control.

Her mom jumped in at that statement. As a parent, Kegel said, it is her
responsibility to protect her daughter's rights, even from well-meaning
school officials.

She is writing to Kennedy to ask the school to reconsider the requirement.

She is also unimpressed by Kennedy's claim that this isn't based on any idea
that the charter school has much of a drug problem, but rather on a
suggestion from a student group called "Students Against Destructive
Decisions."

Almost everyone, including teens using drugs, is against destructive
decisions. But Kegel has the same qualms I do: The drug-tests will be a
drill that trains even smart and drug-free kids to submit and to think it
routine to have to regularly prove their innocence to authorities, or else.

For Americans, such a drug-test system could itself be a destructive
decision.